English lower leagues

[roughyedspud]

just curious, is that pounds or aud?

aud

 

[roughyedspud]

How many members does the trust have spud?

Dunno...it a rumoured to one of the largest RL trusts in the uk though

 

[langpark]

A record crowd for Dewsbury today (4,068). Though would it be safe to say that over 2/3 of them were Bradford fans?

 

[RedVee]

http://www.rugbyoldham.org/

Thanks, seems like a great initiative.

 

[langpark]

Swinton and North Wales Crusaders are in to the League 1 Cup Final after beating Newcastle and Oldham respectively.

 

[roughyedspud]

444 at whitebank tonight,about 100 travelling crusaders fans..

Listened to the game on local radio while getting ready for work,sounded a cracking game,crusaders winning 18-16..

 

[langpark]

Brilliant, yeah i was following the updates on twitter. Sounded like they almost fought back right at the end there. But (without having seen the match) it was 3 tries to 2, so perhaps the better team did win in the end.

 

[roughyedspud]

If you download the tune in radio app you can listen to 'oldham community radio' and the wonderfully biased commentary of every oldham game lol

 

[langpark]

Barrow 86-0 South Wales Scorpions.

Is everything ok at the Scorpions or has something big happened there recently? (ie, injuries, new coach, transfers, financial strife?) Last week they lost 50-12, now this.

 

[Evil Homer]

Barrow 86-0 South Wales Scorpions.

Is everything ok at the Scorpions or has something big happened there recently? (ie, injuries, new coach, transfers, financial strife?) Last week they lost 50-12, now this.

I'm not sure what's going on, I went to watch them a couple of times in their foundation season a few years ago and they did pretty well, I think they made the play-offs and attracted relatively decent crowds too, but things seem to have gone downhill from there. They were quite reliant on Wigan dual-reg players for a while which I don't think they are getting anymore, and I think that also the ownership has changed and they have moved stadiums. There always seems to be one or two teams in the doldrums at the bottom of League One, London Skolars have gone backwards too and are now behind the likes of Hemel, Gloucestershire and Oxford.

 

[langpark]

What a shame! At a time when grassroots League seems to be going quite well in Wales too!

 

[CC_Roosters]

What a shame! At a time when grassroots League seems to be going quite well in Wales too!

They had a re-structure in wales rl recently. From what i can gather the WRL are no longer directly involved in the scorpions and are putting a lot of effort into making the cardiff side successful

National conference south has around 4 or 5 welsh teams competing

 

[Evil Homer]

What a shame! At a time when grassroots League seems to be going quite well in Wales too!

Yeah, it's quite strange, the team a few years ago was mostly just trialists from the Welsh amateur teams or RU and they were able to be competitive in what was probably a stronger division, so you'd think they wouldn't have too many problems getting a competitive side even with a lack of funds. They seem to have quite a high turnover of players every year, I know the guy who was their halfback for most of last year and he doesn't seem to be there anymore, and I think a couple of other players have signed for Gloucestershire or other clubs. As CC_Rooster said, the WRL stepped in at one point and I think they may have had their funding cut, which could explain some of the problems.

 

[bowes]

They had a re-structure in wales rl recently. From what i can gather the WRL are no longer directly involved in the scorpions and are putting a lot of effort into making the cardiff side successful

National conference south has around 4 or 5 welsh teams competing

Three Welsh clubs in the Conference League South: Valley Cougars, Torfaen Tigers and The Raiders.

Valley Cougars and Torfaen Tigers are based in the valleys near to where Scorpions have relocated this season. The Raiders are based in LLanelli and are basically last season's Under 19 academy

 

[IowaRL]

Too many teams seem to be struggling in Champ 1. York, South Wales are just 2 examples

How much do you think it'd cost to buy/run a Champ 1 team? Ebbsfleet united style

 

[roughyedspud]

Got a meeting with the oldham owner on monday evening at the glorious whitebank..

 

[deluded pom?]

How much do you think it'd cost to buy/run a Champ 1 team? Ebbsfleet united style

That's always appealed to me too. For those not familiar with Ebbsfleet, they are a non league English soccer club and are/were owned by people all over the world via the internet. You would pay an annual fee and obviously the club's budget depends on the number of members they can attract. Membership allowed you to vote on club matters on the internet using a members only forum. A successful club would attract more members and increase revenue. Members could also voluntarily donate extra funds if a player became available on the transfer market. The club would get funding and the theory was that members would buy the club's merchandise and possibly attend games if they were ever in the area. Whether it ran that smoothly I'm not sure because last time I looked they were still non league.

 

[deal.with.it]

I thought WRL took over ownership of Scorpions last year, as the previous owner/chairman was stepping aside?

 

[langpark]

I think over the last 5 years they may be walking a fine line between good growth and overplaying their hand. I just hope it's sustainable. In League One there are currently (from non-heartland areas):

- Gloucestershire
- Coventry
- Hemel
- Crusaders
- Scorpions
- Skolars
- Newcastle
- Oxford

That's the majority of the league! To be fair, some are quite well established now and seem to be built upon fairl strong foundations (like Newcastle for example). But I think the next few seasons will be critical for some of these team and whether or not they can survive long-term. There should certainly be no more expansion for the next 3-4 years minimum, so they can consolidate.

 

[CC_Roosters]

I think over the last 5 years they may be walking a fine line between good growth and overplaying their hand. I just hope it's sustainable. In League One there are currently (from non-heartland areas):

- Gloucestershire
- Coventry
- Hemel
- Crusaders
- Scorpions
- Skolars
- Newcastle
- Oxford

That's the majority of the league! To be fair, some are quite well established now and seem to be built upon fairl strong foundations (like Newcastle for example). But I think the next few seasons will be critical for some of these team and whether or not they can survive long-term. There should certainly be no more expansion for the next 3-4 years minimum, so they can consolidate.

I would say that Crusaders bottomed out after the financial crisis in their SL days, to me they look sustainable now and would not be surprised to see them in the chamionship next season. The growth of the amateur and junior game in wales should give them enough talent to be sustainable and competitive in the second tier at least.

I am thinking that a fourth tier below league one is necessary, the most sustainable structure for the game in the UK i can see is 4 divisions of 10 teams each or 3 divisions but the third tier being split to have east and west. The key which they really need to do now anyway is have the central funding grants large enough to sustain and at least make the top 2 divisions fully pro.

Going roughly off the current leagues

Super league (10 teams)- Wigan, Wire, Leeds, Saints, Hull FC, Hull KR, Widnes, Catalans, Huddersfield, Salford

Championship (10 teams)- Wakey, Cas, Fev, Leigh, Bradford, london, dewsbury, halifax, Toulouse, sheffield

League 1 East (10 teams)- Hunslet, Keighly, Doncaster, York, Newcastle, hemel, Skolars, Coventry Oxford, Batley

League 1 West (9 teams)- Workington, Whitehaven, Barrow, Oldham, Rochdale, Swinton, Gloucester, South wales, North wales

I would have the league 1 east and west winners playoff for the right to promotion to the championship, while have 2 up and 2 down between SL and the championship.

Lack of games will be the call by chairmen up and down the land so to compensate have a new cup competition combining the top two divisions in randomly drawn groups champions league style into a knockout stage (4 groups of 5?). Should give all up 26 games + finals + challenge cup